Engraved friezes and statues of winged bulls and lions have been reduced to rubble, and the complex’s most striking feature – a stepped pyramid known as a ziggurat – has been bulldozed to a fraction of its former height.

“When you came here before, you could imagine the life as it used to be. Now there is nothing,” tribal militia commander Ali al-Bayati, visiting the site for the first time in two years told AFP.

“One hundred per cent has been destroyed,” he added. “Losing Nimrud is more painful to me than even losing my own house.”

Intricate temple friezes have been bulldozed by Isis at Nimrud (AFP)

Isis propaganda videos of militants smashing precious frescos and tombs of Assyrian kings with sledgehammers as well as dynamiting temples and other buildings in Nimrud in 2015 were condemned as an attack on “the world’s shared heritage” by Unesco, the UN’s cultural body.

In Isis’ twisted interpretation of Sunni Islam, all non-Muslim culture is heretical and should be destroyed.

The jihadis captured the area in the summer of 2014 – at the same time they took over Mosul, 20 miles to the north – when Isis managed to capture one third of Iraq and declared their caliphate.

A tablet shows the ancient ruins of Nimrud as they were before the destruction took place (AFP)

Most of the militants were pushed out of the area over the weekend, Iraqi army officials said, but troops and local residents alike are wary of sniper fire and the possibility the ruins are rigged with improvised explosive devices, as was the case when Isis retreated from the Syrian city of Palmyra.

Unusually, Isis has not claimed the recent extra damage to Nimrud, but Michael Danti, the director of American Schools of Oriental Research Cultural Heritage Initiatives, said much of the militants’ activity since the US-backed Iraqi coalition effort to retake Mosul began last month has been erratic.

The Iraqi army is now painstakingly trying to secure the area. “We want to make sure we don’t inflict even the least damage to buildings in Nimrud already damaged by the evil [Isis],” a colonel in the 9th Armoured Division told Reuters.

Iraqi soldiers at the archaeological site of Nimrud (AFP/Getty Images)

Isis is still in control of the ancient city of Nineveh, in the centre of Mosul, and Khorsabad, another Assyrian site to the northeast, is close to the front line of the current conflict as US-backed troops attempt to push the miltants out of Iraq completely.

The Destruction of Nimrud

The Destruction of Nimrud

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An Iraqi soldier stands in front a damaged part of the ancient site of Nimrud, which destroyed by the Islamic State militants.
The late 1980s discovery of treasures in Nimrud's royal tombs was one of the 20th century's most significant archaeological finds

AP

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A part of carved stone slabs which were destroyed by the Islamic State militants, is seen at the ancient site of Nimrud

AP

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An Iraqi army officer sits on damaged carved stone slabs, which were destroyed by Islamic State militants, at the ancient site of Nimrud

AP

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A part of carved stone slabs which were destroyed by the Islamic State militants, is seen at the ancient site of Nimrud some 19 miles (30 kilometers) southeast of Mosul, Iraq. Iraqi troops entered Nimrud on Sunday in what was the most significant gain in several days for government force

AP

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An Iraqi soldier stand guards at the entrance of the ancient site of Nimrud

AP

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An Iraqi soldier looks to the damaged ancient site of Nimrud, which was destroyed by Islamic State militant.
The government said the IS militants, who captured the site in June 2014, destroyed it the following year, using heavy military vehicles

AP

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Iraqi forces on assess the damage to the ancient site of Nimrud

AP

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Iraqi forces announced that Nimrud, which was founded in the 13th century and became the capital of the Assyrian empire, was recaptured as part of the massive operation to retake Mosul, the last IS-held city in the country

Getty

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Back in 2003, during a brief re-opening of the Baghdad museum to display the ancient Nimrud treasures.
An Iraqi man and woman cry as they visit the Assyrian gallery

Reuters

“Liberation of ancient Iraqi archaeological sites from the control of the forces of dark and evil is a victory not only for Iraqis but for all humanity,” Iraq’s deputy culture minister Qais Hussein Rashid said on Monday after the army announced it had retaken Nimrud.

Locals whose families had protected and preserved the ruins for decades mourned its loss, however, as the evidence suggested there is not much left to celebrate.